Under pressure from the federal courts, the Environmental Protection Agency will take final action on coal ash standards by Dec. 19.

Pennsylvania has 35 coal ash ponds at seven plants, says EarthJustice. They have been given a “high hazard” rating by EPA, which means that if they failed there would be a loss of life. Three of those sites have been rated “significant,” the environmental group says, which means that if they failed there would be a major economic loss and environmental damage.

Almost all the Pennsylvania-based ponds that house the coal ash are older than 35 years and one is about 60 years old. EarthJustice says that their age means that they unlikely to have safeguards such as liners and leachate collections systems.

EPA promised more than five years ago to craft rules that would decide to either to preserve coal ash’s standing as a non-hazardous waste or to change it to a hazardous waste. The ruling would be significant for a utility industry that now recycles about 40 percent of its coal ash into such products as cement and dry wall. The industry says that a hazardous waste ruling would stigmatize the reuse of coal ash.

The debate reached a feverish pitch in December 2008 in the aftermath of coal ash spill in Kingston, Tenn., at a facility run by the Tennessee Valley Authority. There, 1.1 billion gallons of toxic waste was smeared across 300 acres -- an event that the EPA called one of the worst environmental disasters to have occurred in this country.

“FirstEnergy supports federal standards that would classify coal combustion residuals as non-hazardous, and the company is complying with robust ash disposal standards in the states in which it operates,” says Stephanie Walton, spokesperson for the utility via email.

FirstEnergy (NYSE: FE) is under attack in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, whose property owners are suing the utility over groundwater pollution emanating from an unlined impoundment that crosses the state borders at Beaver County and Hancock County, W.Va.

The suit, filed last year, says the Bruce Mansfield power plant holds 20 billion gallons of combustion waste products, some of which are leaching into water basins.

EPA’s consent to issue rules for coal ash comes atop an accident on Sunday at a facility owned by Duke Energy in Eden, N.C. The Charlotte-based utility said Monday that 50,000 to 82,000 tons of coal ash were released from a retired coal plant and into the Dan River.

Ken Silverstein is an Energy Inc. contributor based in Charleston, W.Va.